Thursday, February 21, 2013

A couple of weeks ago, I had the good
fortune of being invited to judge a chili cook-off. Alert readers
will not be surprised because in the past I have judged beer
contests, owned a restaurant, plus I enjoy the Miss
Universe pageant (and as the saying goes, how come the winner always
resides on earth?). However, the judging requirements at this
contest were a little less demanding.

On a cold, windy, rainy day, I happened
to be wandering around the outside of a large sporting goods store
waiting for my guns to be serviced (not the real reason I was there
but I need to demonstrate some Texan bona fides). Someone grabbed me
and asked if I liked chili. I said yes, and the next thing I knew,
he was placing a “judge” lanyard over my neck and escorting me to
a table. (I suspect if I had said, “no”, the next question would
have been “Are you capable of swallowing food?” and my
affirmative answer would have established my credentials as a chili
judge.)

I sat down at a picnic table with five
other very well qualified judges who could write numerals and
remember not to double dip his/her spoon in the chili. An elderly
woman (who I will now refer to as Mrs. Wolf) at the end of the table
passed out scoring sheets and pencils. She noted that we all had
bottled water at our places and that we were not to touch her beer
that she had hidden in the box with the twelve bowls of chili.

We casually introduced ourselves, and I
alertly noticed across the table the woman with the low cut top who
put her best feet forward if you know what I mean. Anxious to start
judging, I immediately penciled her in as an “8”.

Mrs. Wolf gave us instructions: we
were to judge the chili on aroma, color, taste, consistency, and
after-taste, and that we would assign a single number between 1 and
10 for each entry. We needed to keep our scores hidden from other
judges, we were not allowed to talk about the chili, and most
important of all, do not double dip your spoon! Always use a fresh
spoon to taste! (At the time, I didn't think about it, but the
thought of passing those bowls around on a cold, rainy day in the
middle of flu season and relying on strangers to not double dip makes
me question my sanity.)

Finally, Mrs. Wolf passed out the first
set of bowls, and we got to work. I opened the lid on the first
entry and inhaled a very nice fresh chili aroma. I studied the color
then took a taste, allowing it to linger on the tongue, then chewed
lightly to check the consistency. I dropped my spoon in the dump
bucket to avoid the temptation to double dip before giving deep
thought to the after-taste. With the exception of a little grease
around the edge of the bowl, it was very good. But this was my first
taste, and the only thing for me to compare it with was my own
personal chili history. Not wanting to score it too high, I gave it
a 6, closed the lid, and passed it on.

By now, three chili bowls had stacked
up beside me. Apparently, I was judging much slower than the other
judges, perhaps giving too much deep thought to each of the five
criteria. I watched the Ms. 8 across from me as she judged. She
opened the lid, took a quick taste, closed the lid and wrote a score
down, all in about 4 seconds. I wondered if I should complain to
Mrs. Wolf that perhaps other judges were not taking this as seriously
as they should be. But the man next to me cleared his throat loudly
to alert me to the four chili bowls piled up next to me. I demoted
the non-judgmental Ms. 8 to Ms. 7 due to a lack of integrity and
decided I needed to keep my eye on her.

The second bowl of chili didn't smell
as good as the first, but other than that, it was about the same. I
scored it a 7 and started thinking I had under-scored the first bowl.
By the third bowl, I knew I had under-scored the first as the third
tasted the same as the first two. Half-way through the samples, I
had scored one “6” and six “7”s. I became despondent. If
Mrs. Wolf studied my scores, she might kick me out as a failure of a
judge.

I decided to be more open-minded.
Unfortunately, this caused me to slow down. I avoided making eye
contact with the other judges, but I felt their stares.

I ignored them. As I went along, I
noticed that besides the first bowl, none of the others had any aroma
at all, so I downgraded their scores as appropriate. Then I realized
I had a runny nose from all the spiciness and really couldn't smell
anything anymore. Just as I opened the lid of the next bowl, the man
next to me reached across the bowl to grab a packet of crackers and
nearly dipped his elbow in the bowl. I jerked the bowl away and gave
him a sharp look.

“Sorry about that, hope I didn't get
in your way,” he said.

“Well, I did almost have to note that
this entry tasted like a dirty flannel shirt.”

“Don't talk about the chili!” Mrs.
Wolf admonished us.

The next entry was a bit salty. But it
was good and except for the extra salt it tasted just like the rest,
so I gave it a 6. At this point, I felt like I needed to declare a
winner. Even though we were only judging twelve out of the 130
entries, I felt like I needed to make the decision that one entry­--a
single outstanding specimen of meat, tomato sauce, chili powder, and
MSG--reigned supreme. So when I got the next bowl, I noticed it
tasted just like the others, but I gave it an 8. The champion!

I still had two bowls left to judge
when I noticed everyone staring at me. Again.

“No judge may leave the table until
all judges have finished,” Mrs. Wolf said.

The woman formerly known as an 8 sighed
loudly, leaned over the table and glared at me. “Some of us still
need to get our ammo,” she said with a sneer as she jerked a thumb
towards the mammoth front doors of Guns-N-Stuff-R-Us.

I grabbed my score sheet and marked her
down to a 4. I finally finished and turned in my score sheet with
two 6’s, nine 7’s and one 8. My only regret was not knocking the
salty entry down to a 5 and not scoring the first entry as a 7.

So to all the chili contestants: I
apologize for ruining your contest. You may as well have drawn the
winner from a hat. But honestly, all the entries tasted nearly
identical. So . . . you're all winners in my book!

Thursday, February 14, 2013

If you watch television, you are
probably familiar with the DirectTV genie commercial where a mysterious genie appears in front of a television screen
like Vanna White, and I guess adjusts the volume or changes the
channel for you. I have nothing against genies and was a big fan of
“I Dream of Jeannie” with Barbara Eden, and I even enjoy the
genie from Bugs Bunny cartoons. But for some reason I find the Direct TV genie about as appealing
as a week-old tumbler of bourbon and coke with cigarette butts
soaking in it. She looks like an underage streetwalker after a really
bad night.

So, although the genie is supposed to
entice us into ordering Direct TV, I just get horrific images of her
materializing out of nowhere:

. . . I came back from the kitchen
with a bowl of popcorn in my hand when I noticed the genie draped
across my television set. She smiled and waved at me, then fell to
the floor with a shriek.

“What the--?”

“I'm good, I'm okay,” she said,
struggling to her feet. “So, you want some Direct TV?”

Thursday, February 7, 2013

With Valentine's Day coming up, it's
time for a public service announcement from this blog.

I've written about the problem of menunderdressing their women before and yet for some reason, my
pleas have not changed the world. So let's start slow and small with
something very specific: the baseball cap.

I've seen too many instances of women
dressed nicely waiting for her date, only for the date to show up in
some sort of ensemble of t-shirt, shorts or jeans and to top it all
off, a baseball cap! And sometimes the baseball cap is on backwards.

Gentlemen, if you are preparing for a
date, and you find yourself rummaging through your closet trying to
find which baseball cap you think your date will find you more
attractive in, please stop! Yes, it will make you look younger
except that it will make you look younger than the age of consent.
The baseball cap should be banished from your wardrobe when you have
retired from little league or whenever it was that you last played
organized baseball.

The baseball cap is not a fashion
accessory. A good rule of thumb is when dressing for a night out, if
you wish to put something on your head, if it cannot be considered a
chapeau, you shouldn't wear it. A baseball cap is not a chapeau even
if you call it Le baseball cap. And don’t be cute: a vintage
Le Montreal Expos hat is no exception.

The only acceptable time to wear a
baseball cap is if you have to go in public and haven't washed your
hair (i.e. you are sporting a classic bedhead) or you are partaking
in some strenuous outdoor physical activity and you need to protect
your scalp from the sun. Wearing a baseball cap while golfing is
acceptable, but once you reach the age of forty, you are culturally
obliged to purchase one of those expansive Tom Kite or Greg Norman
straw hats.

If you are over the age of 22, you
shouldn't even wear a baseball cap while attending a professional
baseball game. Grow up and get a derby, or a homburg, or a Panama,
or even a fedora.

And God forbid, a baseball cap should
never be worn backwards unless you are a professional baseball
catcher or a successful rapper.

And if I can't get through to the
gentlemen, I'm going to appeal directly to the women:

If your date shows up wearing a
baseball cap, at the minimum swat it from his head. That's what the
bill of the cap is for. If he manages to dodge that, say, “Oh, did
you win your little league game? Shall we go get a sno-cone?”

Or, you can just flat out dump him. [To
all you non-cap-wearing guys out there waiting to pounce on the
fallout of this global “dumping”: You’re welcome.]

So Gentlemen, as you prepare for your
big Valentine's date next week, remember that if you don a baseball
cap for the Big Night Out, expect to have it knocked off. And not in
a moment of passion.

[St. Pauli Girl interrupts this blog to
ask how many baseball hats I have.]

Yes, okay, I have somewhere between ten
and twenty, but I have never worn one on a date. And after I finish
this blog post, I am trading them all in for a homburg, a bowler, and
a giant Tom Kite hat. Except for my Augusta cap. I might need it in
an emergency.

Friday, February 1, 2013

Awhile back, I heard the classic 70's
song, “The Devil Went Down To Georgia” by the Charlie Daniels
Band on the radio. I listened closely to the devil's fiddle solo and
realized it wasn't very good. This left me very perplexed about the
song.

How did the devil lose, and why did he
make the bet if he knew he wasn't very good?

To recap the song:

The devil is in Georgia trying to steal
some souls when he comes across Johnny playing his fiddle. So the
devil bets a fiddle of gold against Johnny's soul that the devil is a
better fiddler. They both play some songs then the devil bows his
head because he knows he's been beat, and he lays the fiddle of gold
at Johnny's feet.

So where did the devil go wrong?

( you can listen to the whole song here
or just the devil's solo at about the 1:25 mark)

The devil's solo is introduced with
“and it sounded something like this” and we immediately hear a
guitar and/or funky piano. Apparently, the devil brought a backing
band. Is that allowed? Okay, he's the devil so we should expect a
little gamesmanship at best. A few seconds later, we can hear the
fiddle coming in with a slight smoldering touch, but the fiddle never
really takes over the song. I'm willing to bet the devil had never
even played the fiddle before.

Simon Cowell probably would have said,
“Satan, that was not your best effort. You needed an inferno and
you brought a bic lighter. I mean, you're playing for someone's
soul! You just let the background music take over and stood there
like a demonic Stu Sutcliffe bringing nothing to the stage. I really
doubt you'll be back next week.”

Was he forced to play the gold fiddle?
I would think that would be pretty heavy and would throw anyone off
his game. Plus I imagine it would sound metallic at best.

The devil had the upper hand too. He
had already heard Johnny playing before he made the bet. He had to
know he didn't have the chops to take Johnny down. He should have
insisted on having judges for the contest:

“To be fair,” the devil could have
said, “we'll need an impartial group of judges. Luckily these fine
gentlemen followed me here: Hitler, Stalin and William Tecumseh
Sherman.”

There's no way Sherman lets someone
from Georgia win.

He could have at least demanded two out
of three.

But the whole reason I got to thinking
about the song again was because I recently listened to the version
by Those Darn Accordions from my massive music library.

Their version has the same basic plot
except the fiddle is an accordion and Johnny is a girl named Big Lou.
(Granted they should have changed the setting to Milwaukee or
Waukesha but that's beside the point.) Most importantly, in this
version, the devil pulls out his accordion and puts down the squeeze.
You can hear the fire coming from the bellows. Big Lou still wins
but at least the devil puts up a fight.

So I believe the accordion version is
far superior to the Charlie Daniels version because in that version
the devil brings a backing band to a fiddle fight while in the
accordion version it's a fiery, one man accordion solo.

But most of all, we can all be happy
that Steve Miller didn't write it as it would
have gone something like this:

“Devil went down to oooh, old El Paso

Bet a gold fiddle against Johnny's soul

Father Mahoney ain't gonna let Satan
escape justice

Headed down south and Johnny's still
fiddlin' today”

(And they would probably do a drum solo
for the devil's fiddle part)

Notes: There's actually a youtube clip
of Those Darn Accordions playing the song live. Surprisingly, it
defeats my argument as it sticks closely to the Charlie Daniels
version. However, if you look up the studio version on itunes, you
can actually sample the pertinent parts of the song I'm talking
about. And if you do check out the youtube clip and you're a fan of
The Who, you owe it yourself to check out “Baba O'Riley”.

About Me

I live in a small town in Texas. I am the real America. I wasn't born in the republic which means I'm not really Texan. I do have a pickup truck but since it's a Nissan, I'm still not considered Texan. I only drive it when no one is looking. I'm a man without a country and a man without a car. I'm an entrepreneur but not a good one as I recently had to close down the family restaurant. But that makes me an economic expert. I can seriously blame the restaurant's closing on Obama, Cheney, NAFTA, Cash for Clunkers, TARP and even Bernie Madoff who never spent millions in my restaurant. Not even a dime.